They maintain economic power through the control and harsh repression of anyone who stands in the way of their economic enrichment and political control, and anyone criticizing their policies and actions.

Again, I want to thank Mr. Royce for his leadership, and Mr. Salmon for his leadership, and we will be watching.

I would hope that our Embassy and also our people who are involved with aid and trying to develop trade relationships with these countries will not forget, especially when an American citizen is put in jail.

Helping governments like the Philippines is not something that I find objectionable, but I do find it objectionable that we are providing any type of assistance that would take away the burden of that government to their own people of…

We cannot expect private companies to invest tens of millions of dollars if we cannot provide them with any certainty or vision on a return on their investment.

The Committee on Homeland Security will come to order.

I want to find out what happened. But more importantly, again, this goes back to the systemic issue.

Administrator Neffenger, you have a tough job ahead of you to lead this agency but we have confidence in you.

The threat is evolving. But Americans are concerned that TSA is not keeping up with that threat.

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:10 a.m.

We expect to explore a range of issues related to the operations of the TSA.